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A Brooklyn man reportedly recovered his stolen iPhone using an online trick as old as Usenetpretending to be an attractive woman and seducing the thief.

Nadav Nirenberg, a trombone player with a New York punk band, left his phone in a cab on New Year's Eve, according to the New York Post, which detailed the 27-year-old's story on Friday.

The next day, Nirenberg began receiving email alerts from hookup site OKCupid saying the iPhone was being used to send messages to women using the website. More like "OKStupid," am I right?

At any rate, when he discovered that he could access all of the thief's activity on the website, the Brooklynite and a pal devised a clever way to get the man to meet up with them and hopefully return the Apple device.

As the Post tells it, Nirenberg created a fake profile on OKCupid with a randomly downloaded image of an attractive, busty woman and the name "Jennifer Gonzalez." He began messaging the iPhone thief with flirty messages that eventually suggested they meet for a "date" at Nirenberg's apartment, where the musician planned to position himself outside to surprise his adversary.

"I used lots of winks and smiley faces so I would seem like a girl," Nirenberg told the Post.

The upshoton New Year's Day, "the bandit knocked on [Nirenberg's] door at around 7 p.m. holding a bottle of wine. He was clean-shaven and smelled like cologne," according to the newspaper.

Out of online tricks, Nirenberg went IRL in a hurry, sneaking up behind the thief with a hammer in hand and demanding his phone back. The thief complied, according to the Post, and even traded the wine for $20 in an encounter that lasted all of 20 seconds.

Nirenberg told the paper he wouldn't be pressing charges and was just happy to have his phone back.

Damon Poeter got his start in journalism working for the English-language daily newspaper The Nation in Bangkok, Thailand. He covered everything from local news to sports and entertainment before settling on technology in the mid-2000s. Prior to joining PCMag, Damon worked at CRN and the Gilroy Dispatch. He has also written for the San Francisco Chronicle and Japan Times, among other newspapers and periodicals.
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